The match reached 7 minutes and 25 seconds.
After clearing the bot wave, both bottom lanes took a few synchronized steps back and hit Recall in perfect unison.
On the commentator desk, Da Ju immediately noticed the marksman-support duo’s movement and raised his voice. “At around seven and a half minutes, both sides are recalling at the same time, and the objective is obvious! When Key and Erlllit come back out, they’re definitely heading to contest vision around the Rift Herald! Even the marksmen are rotating over to help—”
[UG_Key] is on the way!
[PNG_Erlllit] is on the way!
“I’m bringing wards after this recall.”
Kim Seok-chan rapidly pinged as he directed his teammates to secure positions near the Herald pit in advance. “Can we get there first and hold the area?”
UG’s vision spotted PNG stirring as well, moving toward the Herald.
“Mmm…” Jung Seung-soo was clearing the red-side jungle while glancing at the minimap. “OK, I can get there immediately. Hyun-woo hyung, can you rotate over?”
“Got it, I’m here. Let’s reveal the vision on the left side of mid first.” Choi Hyun-woo spoke while tossing skills into the brush to scout. “Come around from this side.”
“OK.”
Kim Seok-chan pinged the top-side tri-brush again. This was an extremely important strategic point for fights around the objective pit. “Se-woo, check this area first, OK? I’ll be there soon!”
Park Se-woo sounded troubled. “I’ll try—”
Looking at Wei Ye, who also wanted to move over and establish vision, Park Se-woo raised his weapon and landed an AAQ combo onto him.
He knew very well that positioning in this brush before an objective fight required extreme caution. The brush was fairly far from the front entrance to the pit, and a single mistake could separate him too much from his teammates and cause the formation to break apart.
Because of that, the players stationed around this area were usually tanky frontliners or bruisers.
But this game, Park Se-woo was playing Shadowmoon Gun. For him, this brush was extremely dangerous territory, so all he could do was try to trade and poke with Wei Ye first.
At the same time, Cheng Su was also hurrying over.
“Don’t rush, don’t rush! The Herald only spawns at eight minutes! Setting up vision too early just means the enemy can clear it for free!” Cheng Su shouted tensely. “Treant’s trolling his ass off over there, don’t lose too much HP! Be careful of getting collapsed on—we don’t have wards around that area!”
“Fuck, I know, quit nagging!”
Sui Ning pressed Tab and swept his gaze across both teams’ information panels, frowning slightly. “This Herald fight isn’t very good for us. Priority is harassing them so they can’t take it. We don’t engage first—look for a steal opportunity.”
Ji Yunyu nodded. “That works. They’ll definitely pull the Herald out of the pit to fight. Secure river vision first and wait for me.”
“Got it.”
“OKOK, your bro’s here! False is probably hiding in the tower blind spot over there. This river position? Your bro’s definitely taking it!” Lin Zhaoxu let out an energetic “Woohoo!” as he arrived at the scene.
Cheng Su: ?
Cheng Su sneered. “Since when does a marksman get to stand alone for vision? Because your HP bar evaporates in one second during teamfights? If False engages on you, I’m flaming you to death, got it?”
All ten players gradually converged in the upper river. Wei Ye occupied the tri-brush, pinning Park Se-woo’s position and forcing him toward the front side, while also preventing anyone from UG from flanking around the back.
Chao Mi stared fixedly at the river and raised his voice. “We’re almost at eight minutes! Both teams have already set up around the Herald in advance—they absolutely do not want to give up the first Herald!”
“This Herald could determine the direction of the early-to-mid game, especially since PNG is one of the teams that values Rift Herald the most. Their first-Herald take rate in previous matches has been absurdly high!”
Beside him, Qing Ci pulled up the match statistics. “Starting from the semifinals, UG’s emphasis on the first Herald has also increased significantly. A lot of the time they even give up the dragon and rotate to Herald instead, which was pretty rare for them before, since dragons provide Dragon Soul buffs.”
Hearing that, Da Ju bluntly continued, “There’s a good chance they were influenced by PNG. PNG’s map-control style is extremely dominant in the current patch, and aside from them, very few teams start controlling the map as early as three to five minutes into the game.”
[????]
[The hell, I’m gonna be a hypocrite now! Other teams can learn from our strengths, but nobody’s allowed to steal OUR strengths!!]
“But neither Wind nor Cloud have Flash right now, so PNG really shouldn’t engage first.”
At exactly 8:00, the Rift Herald spawned.
Ahn Seung-soo made the first move, auto-attacking the Herald and pulling it out of the pit.
PNG lurked menacingly near the choke point leading into blue side’s blue jungle on the Herald’s left flank. Beside and behind him were his teammates hidden in the fog of war. Kim Seok-chan concealed himself within the shadows, while Lee Dong-il continuously tossed small bombs to harass and chip away at PNG.
Boom! One bomb exploded on Lin Zhaoxu, dropping his HP to 87%.
“Hiss—” Chao Mi sucked in a breath. “This Bombardier is seriously annoying; his range is way too long! Mior’s Void Ranger only comes online later in the game, so there’s really not much he can do about it right now! What happens here? Both teams want the Herald—are they going to fight?!”
Neither side recklessly initiated, but the Herald’s health pool was nowhere near as thick as Baron’s. After only a few attacks, it had already dropped to 50%!
Ji Yunyu immediately tried to move closer to the Herald. Sui Ning stayed by his side, helping him keep watch on Choi Hyun-woo, who was waiting for an opportunity from the opposite side.
As PNG’s mid-jungle duo moved, UG moved as well.
Ahn Seung-soo nervously repeated, “Jungler, jungler, jungler! Don’t let him steal it! I have Smite, I have Smite!”
“I’m poking, I have ult!” Lee Dong-il shouted loudly as he raised his hand and hurled the massive bomb from [R - World Annihilation] toward PNG’s formation—along with the Herald’s position—
The massive bomb’s impact zone covered Cheng Su, Lin Zhaoxu, and Ji Yunyu all at once. Their first instinct was naturally to retreat out of Lee Dong-il’s ultimate range.
“Bombardier uses his ult to force PNG back! PNG should disengage for now—they can’t underestimate Reeco’s damage! Bombardier got the bot-lane gold! If that bomb lands, False might be able to clean up—”
Chao Mi anxiously searched the screen for Choi Hyun-woo’s position. This was the greatest threat PNG had to deal with in this fight!
However, at the exact moment Lee Dong-il threw out his ultimate, at 8:05, a faint golden glow of a level-up lit up simultaneously from a dark brush nearby.
Falling together with the giant bomb was a blinding ray of sunlight—
[R - Final Spark]!
Lin Zhaoxu went pale with shock. “HOLY SHIT!!”
As the primary target of the double-ultimate combo, he was completely unprepared and got rooted on the spot, standing helplessly in the middle of the battlefield like a lamb waiting for slaughter!
“—Final Spark???” Chao Mi shot to his feet in horror, eyes practically bulging out. “Why does Radiant Goddess have ult already?! When did Key even hit level six?! What is happening?!!”
[?????]
[HOLY SHIT??]
[Key is half a level ahead of Erlllit?? But they weren’t even winning in CS!!]
[Jesus Christ, it’s over!!]
The Phantom Trickster shot across the battlefield like a streak of dark violet lightning. At this moment, the little turrets Cheng Su’s Engineer had placed beforehand were completely incapable of protecting Lin Zhaoxu.
This was one of the greatest drawbacks of turning a mage champion into a support!
Hit by the inner circle of Kim Seok-chan’s ultimate, the full two-second stun duration was enough for a squishy marksman to die ten thousand times over!
[UG_False (Phantom Trickster) has slain PNG_Mior (Void Ranger)!]
The marksman died instantly, and the balance of the fight flipped upside down in an instant!
“Even though marksmen don’t really have much gear right now, with Mior down, UG has the numbers advantage!” The commentator nervously tugged at his clothes. “UG still has Leave’s Shadowmoon Gun too, so they’ve still got sustained damage!”
The level-six Radiant Goddess emerged from the brush and advanced forward together with the team.
“When did their support hit level six??”
“What the hell, he leveled at exactly eight minutes?”
“We can’t fight this, we can’t fight this, don’t take the teamfight!” Cheng Su gripped his mouse tightly, speaking rapidly in a hoarse voice. “Take one more look at Herald—is there still a chance?”
Ji Yunyu answered decisively, “Can’t get it anymore. Retreat now!”
PNG immediately disengaged, but Kim Seok-chan didn’t want to let the perfect opportunity slip away and hurriedly called to his teammates, “Chase chase chase, we can chase! Seung-soo, keep doing Herald yourself, don’t reset it!”
“I don’t have skills up. Can anyone hold them?”
“I can!”
Confidently replying, Kim Seok-chan locked onto Sui Ning’s figure just ahead of him. Seizing the timing, he decisively started with an E-Flash combo to instantly close the distance—
His teammates urgently shouted, “Radiant Goddess, Radiant Goddess, be careful, watch him!”
“Just leave first!” Sui Ning spoke curtly as he reacted at lightning speed and pressed R.
“Key wants to Flash-engage and lock someone down—” Chao Mi’s eyes suddenly widened halfway through the sentence. On-screen, a gray-white defensive wall blasted back Kim Seok-chan’s aggressive pursuit!
A wall forged from skeletal soldiers rose in front of Kim Seok-chan, completely blocking his advance!
Chao Mi couldn’t stop himself from roaring, “Winnnnd—!! The timing on [R – Wall of Bones] was absolutely perfect! He directly interrupted Key’s E-Flash combo! That reaction speed was insane—was that even humanly possible?!!”
The distance between the mid laner and support just now had been less than two character lengths apart. To prevent Sui Ning from reacting, Kim Seok-chan had even intentionally used Flash to hide the startup animation of his E skill!
And even then, Sui Ning still reacted and knocked him away with his ultimate? Forget Kim Seok-chan—even Chao Mi, a top-tier Wind fanboy, was starting to question reality!
[Holy shit, wifey’s in insane form today?? He reacted to THAT??]
[That R interrupting the E-Flash almost made me spill my cola, who understands me…]
[#TheTrueValueOfAGeniusMidLaner# Just tell me if this value is high or not!]
[Wifey’s already 19 this year, I’m so mad. Imagine how strong he’d be if he were 16?]
[Trainee system ruined him!!]
[He couldn’t even register at 16; at most, he’d play HDL, what’s the point? His current form is peak—debuting straight into double-champion UG. Other teams were beneath him anyway (smug)!]
[Funniest joke is that even Key looked stunned by that play…]
Kim Seok-chan really was stunned for a moment. He had never expected an E-Flash from that distance to get pushed away!
If Sui Ning had dodged with Flash, he could’ve accepted it. After all, Flash activated instantly and had no startup animation.
But Kim Seok-chan remembered clearly that Sui Ning’s Flash was still on cooldown. The Soulreaper King’s R had a visible casting animation. To use R to interrupt his E-Flash either required reaction speed beyond human limits—or pure prediction!
“…Ah,” Kim Seok-chan muttered, starting to doubt life itself, tongue twisting slightly. “Aish… he could even react to that…?”
[UG_False (Phantom Trickster) has slain PNG_Myerii (Verdant Treant)!]
[Double Kill!]
The short-legged tree spirit failed to escape. Wei Ye groaned miserably, shouting, “How the hell are they still catching me?!”
Choi Hyun-woo secured the double kill together with Park Se-woo and comforted him, “It’s fine, it’s fine, we got huge value here. Soulreaper King has Flash next fight but no ultimate—it’s useless!”
“Right.” Kim Seok-chan immediately snapped back to his senses and repeated himself. “Right, just punish the cooldown mismatch on his skills! Secure the Herald!”
Ahn Seung-soo pressed Smite and steadily claimed the Rift Herald for UG!
Chao Mi slapped his thigh in anguish. “Aaaah—PNG lost so much from this play!”
They got hit with a zero-for-two trade and lost the Herald on top of it!!
“The main thing is that PNG never expected Key to suddenly hit level six! This entire Herald fight advantage was created by Key alone. The moment Radiant Goddess’s ultimate came down, the fight was decided in one blow!”
Coach Da Ju frowned deeply and raised his voice. “Key was already nearly half a level ahead of Erlllit, and after that fight, Erlllit still hasn’t hit level six! Even if Engineer hitting six doesn’t contribute that much in a teamfight, this experience gap is absurd. PNG absolutely has to pay attention to this!”
PNG’s bot lane hadn’t even been crushed into hiding under tier-two tower at three minutes. Earlier on, Sui Ning’s roam bot had even killed Lee Dong-il once and forced Kim Seok-chan back to base too!
And looking at the CS count, Lee Dong-il and Lin Zhaoxu were separated by fewer than four minions. That meant both sides had basically just been laning and farming normally!
Coach Da Ju’s breathing grew faster and faster. It was exactly this seemingly ordinary early game that made it terrifying—how could Kim Seok-chan still somehow be half a level ahead of Cheng Su? Why? Where did all that experience come from?
Could it really all be from soaking mid-lane XP around the five-minute mark?
Or had Kim Seok-chan actually been roaming around secretly leeching experience elsewhere too, accumulating small advantages over time, while the observers and commentators simply never focused on him enough to notice?
“The key point is that PNG has no idea where Key soaked experience from, or how much he got! That led to a huge miscalculation in their prediction of his level-six timing during the Herald fight! If Key didn’t have that ultimate, Mior never dies there, and afterward PNG wouldn’t have ended up fighting outnumbered!”
Halfway through speaking, Da Ju tried imagining himself in Coach Chen Chen’s shoes backstage right now and felt his head buzzing. “—A straight-up five-versus-four fight. UG could win that with their feet! And there’s no need to explain False’s ability to seize opportunities—once his teammates added even a little extra damage, he instantly got a double kill!!”
“Luckily Wind pulled off that limit reaction play and knocked Key away at the end. Otherwise that E-Flash would’ve pierced through two people and chained into a Q stun. PNG probably loses at least two more players to UG’s damage burst! Leave didn’t even use his ultimate yet!”
[Holy shit, it’s only eight minutes in and I’ve already lost count of how many times I’ve yelled ‘holy shit’…]
[This game is way too advanced. Is this the game understanding of a championship support?]
[Seriously though, hitting level six early like that is insanely sneaky! Level 6 versus level 5, with support having an extra ultimate—it’s so easy to completely flip the situation!]
[I’m sweating now. I genuinely can’t think of how PNG is supposed to counter this XP soaking. Camp him? Trap him in lane? If Key hits level six before every Herald fight, how is PNG supposed to play?]
What kind of monster support gameplay was this? It was practically impossible to guard against! Da Ju felt suffocated just thinking about it. Even he wanted to ask how anyone was supposed to deal with this strategy.
And beyond the obvious losses, PNG had even more problems brewing beneath the surface.
Sui Ning’s Flash cooldown was almost back up, but his ultimate had just been used. With Flash and ultimate now desynced, he would be stuck in a long window where he couldn’t make proactive plays, effectively muting PNG’s mid lane.
Meanwhile, on top lane, Wei Ye’s short-ranged champion had been suffering nonstop against a ranged matchup. Without the Herald crashing into tower to forcibly break the lane open, nobody even knew how much longer his prison sentence in lane would continue.
Da Ju laid out his analysis: “…These disadvantages might not look impactful right away, but later on they could very easily become the breakthrough points UG uses to snowball the game!”
——
And sure enough, after securing the Herald, UG decisively shifted their strategic focus toward mid and top at 10 minutes and 35 seconds.
Ahn Seung-soo played it smart. He didn’t immediately summon the Herald top lane. Instead, he deliberately gave his teammate Park Se-woo more time to continue laning, letting his Shadowmoon Gun freely bully Wei Ye in lane.
Wei Ye’s face practically turned green.
If they had simply dropped Herald top, fine—just let it smash the tower. At least then he could retreat to tier two, continue farming, and slowly reduce the economic gap against Shadowmoon Gun.
But UG intentionally refused to summon it there. They were doing this purely to torment him, extending his “top-lane prison experience trial card” by another ten minutes! Their goal was obvious: prevent PNG’s frontline from ever scaling up!
And that wasn’t even all of it. If it were only Shadowmoon Gun hard-pushing the lane, PNG could still handle it by sending mid and jungle top for a tower dive.
But UG chose to drop the Herald mid instead, which gave PNG a massive headache.
Sui Ning was playing a mage. He simply didn’t have the capability to solo kill a Rift Herald. Yet he had no choice but to stay and deal with it—otherwise if the Herald got two or three charges off, wouldn’t the mid tower instantly explode?
And once mid tower fell, PNG’s mid game would basically be over before it even started. Sui Ning could only temporarily abandon roaming.
Not only that, but the ferocious Herald flashing its absurdly thick HP bars forced Ji Yunyu to rotate mid for defense as well.
“Wind can’t handle this Herald alone. Mage champions are terrible at dealing with it!” Qing Ci spoke with concern in his voice. “Cloud has to come help, but that exposes his own position. UG’s side lanes can now shove freely without restraint! This Herald has directly pinned PNG’s mid and jungle together in mid lane!”
Top lane, meanwhile, Park Se-woo was playing far smarter than anyone expected from a bruiser player.
At the start of the game, during the 1v1 phase, he couldn’t accurately track Ji Yunyu’s position. No matter how much Wei Ye tried to bait him, Park Se-woo stubbornly held back with Shadowmoon Gun, hiding his edge and refusing to overextend.
His composure didn’t resemble a hot-blooded bruiser player at all. Instead, he looked like some ancient turtle king who’d spent years playing tank top laners!
But now, with PNG’s mid and jungle trapped by the Herald and minion waves, Park Se-woo instantly shed his earlier caution. He dashed forward with an E-slide and unloaded several volleys of bullets straight into Wei Ye’s face!
Bang bang bang!
Wei Ye had only just returned to lane after recovering, and his HP had already dropped below 80% again!
Grinding his teeth, Wei Ye cursed inwardly: Fuck me—!
Even the old Treant was starting to lose his temper under the enemy’s arrogant pressure.
Then Cheng Su suddenly spoke up: “Support missing!”
Wei Ye had only just decided to start getting angry when his teammates warned him the enemy support was missing, forcing him to swallow his frustration and obediently move into the river to establish vision.
At the same time, jungler Ahn Seung-soo showed himself mid lane, working together with Choi Hyun-woo to pin down PNG’s mid and jungle.
And sure enough, when Wei Ye returned to lane, Park Se-woo immediately blasted him with a few more shots.
Wei Ye no longer had any spare wards on him. The lane brush was dark with no vision, and the more he looked at it, the more he felt an ominous sense of danger lurking there. His scalp started tingling…
At this point, the optimal choice was to recall and replenish. But Park Se-woo refused to give him the chance, freezing the wave dead center in lane. If Wei Ye wanted to go back now, he’d lose both gold and experience!
“God damn it,” Wei Ye gritted his teeth. “Why are you so obsessed with freezing the wave?! What kind of nonsense is this?! Real men never freeze lanes!”
Park Se-woo replied calmly, “Top lane advantage is huge.”
“OK,” Kim Seok-chan said, “I’m coming!”
Before Wei Ye could think of a good way to break the freeze, the brush on the left side of the lane suddenly flickered with light. From the blind spot in vision, a straight beam of golden light shot out—
Kim Seok-chan’s Radiant Goddess had been lying in ambush for a long time, finally waiting for the perfect opportunity. His E skill landed directly onto Wei Ye!
“Huh?? Bro, seriously?” Wei Ye’s expression carried three parts shock and three parts speechlessness. “This support roamed all the way up here?? I’m gonna throw up!”
The guy crossed the entire Rift just to gank him?
Then what else could he do? All he could do was die for UG to see.
[UG_Leave (Shadowmoon Gun) has slain PNG_Myerii (Verdant Treant)!]
“Key timed this perfectly, recalling and immediately heading top for an ambush!” Chao Mi’s vision darkened. “—Myerii walked right into the trap! Top lane was already losing, and now he gets caught and killed again. This lane is impossible to play!”
“PNG can’t even help in time—mid and jungle only just finished dealing with the Herald! Key’s timing control is way too precise. He knew nobody on the enemy side could make it over, so he just walked right into Wei Ye’s face and ganked him openly. Myerii had no way to escape!”
“From securing Herald at eight minutes to getting this top-lane kill at eleven minutes, every piece of macro in these three minutes has been unbelievably smooth and interconnected. Everything was part of UG’s design!”
Coach Da Ju could feel sweat forming on his back. “Key is incredibly smart. He understands perfectly how to exploit his advantages! Erlllit’s Engineer is extremely strong in lane, but once it comes to roaming, he simply can’t achieve the same impact as Radiant Goddess!”
“And on top of that, their own marksman is Bombardier. Once he has enough levels and equipment, he can clear waves alone without any trouble. That’s why Key can roam however he wants—he even roamed all the way top!”
“And this is only Radiant Goddess,” Da Ju said with a bitter smile. “The support UG really wants for this composition is probably Shadow Hawk! If they had Shadow Hawk instead, with both skill-based and ultimate AoE crowd control plus built-in mobility, fast roams, and strong waveclear… honestly, I think PNG should either first-pick Shadow Hawk themselves or keep her permanently banned!”
They absolutely could not let UG have it!
At 13 minutes, another fight broke out in top lane.
Sui Ning immediately moved to support, but Park Se-woo’s mastery of Shadowmoon Gun was exceptionally high. Together with Ahn Seung-soo, they unleashed a full combo and instantly burst down Wei Ye!
Verdant Treant simply wasn’t tanky at all right now!
[UG_Leave (Shadowmoon Gun) has slain PNG_Myerii (Verdant Treant)!]
Fortunately, Wei Ye didn’t give up. Right before dying, he managed to cast his ultimate and crowd control. Park Se-woo reacted quickly enough to escape, but the low-health Ahn Seung-soo got rooted in place instead!
Instinctively, Ahn Seung-soo activated his ultimate, [R - Dawn Guardian], hoping to block the first wave of ranged damage—but Sui Ning’s skeletal soldiers wielded spears, completely ignoring that defensive setup!
[PNG_Wind (Soulreaper King) has slain UG_Serpent (Blade of Dawn)!]
The moment Sui Ning secured the kill, he immediately pressed TP without hesitation while urging his teammates over voice chat: “Dragon, dragon, their jungler’s dead!”
“We can start it!” Ji Yunyu responded instantly.
He was already in position at the dragon pit.
“The 300 gold from the kill itself honestly isn’t that important,” Qing Ci observed PNG’s movement. “The important part is killing Serpent and securing the dragon—they barely manage to come out slightly ahead. Right now the gold difference between the teams is already 4,300, which is a pretty significant deficit for this point in the game.”
The jungle, marksman, and support trio started the dragon while Sui Ning teleported in to help. But UG’s reaction was incredibly fast too. Lee Dong-il tossed a giant bomb directly into the dragon pit, instantly blasting away nearly one-third of Ji Yunyu’s health!
Ji Yunyu’s pupils contracted sharply as he hurriedly pulled the dragon out of the pit.
Choi Hyun-woo immediately tried to find an angle from the flank to assassinate the low-health Ji Yunyu, but luckily Sui Ning had been watching him the entire time. His skeletal soldiers blocked the position, preventing the Phantom Trickster from entering the fight immediately.
Chao Mi jumped in shock. “Whoa, that damage is a little outrageous!”
“Reeco’s poke build is already halfway online!” Da Ju cut straight to the point. “At the same timing and same amount of gold, a normal marksman would have basically no damage. But Bombardier’s scaling curve is naturally skewed toward the early and mid game. Once he finishes one major item, his damage against targets without magic resist is already terrifying!”
“The more I watch UG’s composition, the scarier it feels. Their ‘marksman’ role comes online way faster than a traditional marksman. Once the game reaches mid-game teamfights, there are only two words for this comp: absolutely invincible!”
“And a lot of viewers worry that without a traditional marksman, they’ll lack physical damage, won’t be able to take dragons or push towers, and will struggle to end games—” Da Ju shook his head. “—That’s completely unnecessary worrying. They still have Shadowmoon Gun in top lane. Laning, pushing towers, taking objectives, sustained DPS—it does everything!”
[??????]
[Holy shit… why does that actually make so much sense…??]
[Wait, so Shadowmoon Gun’s true home isn’t bot lane or mid lane, it’s freaking TOP lane??]
[Sounds great, but the real key was still that first Herald! Without support protection and with such a long lane, how could Shadowmoon Gun possibly farm this aggressively? It all depended on Herald pinning down mid and jungle. As long as nobody flanks him, bullying a melee tree spirit is easy!]
Glancing at that comment, Da Ju nodded. “Exactly. That’s why I keep saying UG’s entire setup is interconnected step by step. From the draft itself, creating winning lanes into losing lanes across all three lanes, to Key suddenly hitting level six and securing the Herald—the impact wasn’t limited to a single teamfight. It affected several huge tempo swings afterward as well!”
Before the sentence had even finished, a kill notification rang out.
[UG_False (Phantom Trickster) has slain PNG_Erllit (Goblin Engineer)!]
PNG secured the dragon, and Ji Yunyu barely escaped alive with a sliver of HP, but the short-legged Cheng Su got left behind.
Faced with this situation, the commentators could only helplessly squeeze out one comment: “False is already 3/0.”
At 15 minutes, PNG’s top outer tower fell.
At 16:27, a teamfight erupted in bot lane. Sui Ning found an opening and instantly burst down Ahn Seung-soo, creating space for Lin Zhaoxu to output damage!
[PNG_Wind (Soulreaper King) has slain UG_Serpent (Blade of Dawn)!]
But Lee Dong-il’s bombs were simply too obnoxious. Combined with Park Se-woo’s nonstop front-line gunfire and Choi Hyun-woo lurking nearby waiting to dive in and clean up at any moment, just a little pressure was enough to send Lin Zhaoxu straight to the King of Hell!
Lin Zhaoxu swallowed nervously and played the fight on edge. Wasn’t this supposed to be a high-mobility marksman? Why did he still have to play like some weak little short-legged coward?!
“Serpent mispositioned and got caught by Wind’s QER combo into a knockback burst! But Reeco’s gear is way too good right now. He’s hiding in the backline poking, and it’s really hard to reach him! As long as Reeco stays alive, PNG’s teamfights are incredibly difficult to play…”
At this point, Chao Mi couldn’t help imagining what things would look like if Ji Yunyu had gotten a hard-engage backline diver like Shadow of Vengeance, or if Sui Ning had been on an assassin mage, or if Cheng Su had gotten engage supports like Shadow Hawk or Spirit of the Forest.
Against a Bombardier with no mobility, any one of those three star players could just jump him instantly!
But—none of them had those picks. Not a single one.
Then Chao Mi recalled UG’s bans…A shiver ran down his spine the more he thought about it.
——
Soon enough, Baron spawned at 20 minutes.
PNG had no ability to start the Baron themselves, but they absolutely could not allow UG to take it uncontested. Cheng Su had already set up extensive vision around the Baron area in advance, and as soon as he saw UG gathering around the pit—
“Baron, Baron, we have to defend Baron!”
“What do we do? I feel like we can’t fight this.”
“Don’t panic yet, don’t panic yet. Wait for them to start it!”
“…” Ji Yunyu licked his lower lip. “I’ll see if I can steal it.”
Ahn Seung-soo warned, “Don’t let Cloud get close. His execute threshold is higher than mine!”
“OKOK!”
“Aish! Se-woo, watch your positioning!” Kim Seok-chan reminded him with a grimace. “That spot is really easy for Wind to engage on!”
“Ah, ah, ah, sorry, sorry.”
The commentators shouted excitedly: “UG wants to start Baron… they’re already hitting it! Serpent is tanking, and with Leave’s Shadowmoon Gun, they’re burning it down incredibly fast! Mid, marksman, and support are zoning PNG away from the pit—”
Baron HP: 8700 / 12600.
Baron HP: 5500 / 12600.
……
As Baron neared execute range, PNG’s voice comms became as noisy as a marketplace.
Then Sui Ning suddenly spoke: “Watch my position.”
Before his teammates could even react, Sui Ning seized a gap in Lee Dong-il’s positioning. He opened with WQ plus [E - Boneform Shift], rapidly closing in toward Baron before using an R-Flash to alter the direction of his ultimate knockback—
Three UG players were launched airborne simultaneously!
“——???”
Chao Mi’s breathing stopped for a moment. His brain lagged behind in processing what had just happened. “—W… W…”
[PNG_Wind (Soulreaper King) has slain UG_Reeco (Bombardier)!]
“Winnnnnd!!! R-Flash hitting THREE people!! Cloud and Mior reacted instantly and followed up with damage immediately—Reeco gets melted on the spot!!”
Lee Dong-il groaned in frustration. “Ah! That R-Flash direction change is disgusting!!”
“Fight fight fight!”
“The Baron! Watch Baron HP! —Forget it, reset the Baron!!”
Kim Seok-chan shouted loudly, deciding to sacrifice the objective to preserve the team. Hearing that, Ahn Seung-soo immediately tried to reset Baron aggro and let it heal back up automatically.
But this was exactly what Wei Ye and Ji Yunyu had been waiting for!
Wei Ye stepped into the pit first to draw Baron’s aggro. Losing health didn’t matter. Even dying didn’t matter. As long as Baron didn’t reset its HP, it was worth it!
“I’m tanking Baron! What’s happening on the front line?!” Wei Ye roared.
“We can fight, we can fight, we can fight! Kite around my turrets! I stunned one!”
“Hit whoever’s closest! They don’t have a frontline anymore!!”
On the other side of the fight, Cheng Su’s little turrets finally began to show their value.
Lin Zhaoxu pushed his mechanics to the limit, unleashing an enormous amount of damage in the shortest possible time. Choi Hyun-woo naturally couldn’t allow him to free-fire like that!
The Phantom Trickster locked onto his target. The first cast of W jumped in, but Lin Zhaoxu reacted incredibly fast, using [R - Hunter’s Instinct] to dash away while gaining a shield that blocked the initial burst. But the follow-up damage was still enough to secure the kill!
[UG_False (Phantom Trickster) has slain PNG_Mior (Void Ranger)!]
Yet the extra two or three seconds Lin Zhaoxu bought with his resistance allowed Cheng Su’s turrets to apply their slow effect onto Choi Hyun-woo! Sui Ning had been searching the entire fight for an opportunity to lock him down. The moment he saw the slow land, he moved decisively!
[PNG_Wind (Soulreaper King) has slain UG_False (Phantom Trickster)!]
UG’s double carries were dead, and Baron’s HP had already dropped into execute range!
“Gunner gunner gunner gunner!!”
“Watch Leave, don’t let him touch the Baron!”
Sui Ning immediately warned them, “I’m watching him—he’s circling above the Baron pit, be careful!”
Grinding his teeth, Park Se-woo activated his ultimate and sprayed bullets into the pit!
On the front line, Kim Seok-chan also tried to stop them—
Ji Yunyu calmly pressed Smite.
Woooo—
Baron’s mournful cry echoed throughout the Rift!
“Whose Baron? Whose Baron?!”
“—PNG!!” Chao Mi’s face flushed red with excitement, his vocabulary system completely crashing. “PNG! Beautifully done! They survived from the brink of death!!
If they’d lost that Baron, the game probably would’ve ended very soon!”
“Wind—once again, at the crucial moment, it was him stepping up!! One R-Flash in the Baron river knocking up three people instantly turned the entire fight around! This position is iconic—Soulreaper King has created countless miracle teamfights from this exact spot!!”
“Mior deserves credit too; he got all his damage out! And Cloud secures the Baron with a steady Smite, no problems at all! Every single member of PNG played this fight perfectly!”
Da Ju was clapping excitedly too, his hands turning red from the force of it. But very quickly, new concern appeared on his face. “But for PNG, this Baron only buys them one more breath. UG still holds the lead in gold, towers, map vision, and overall resources!”
——
Still, at the very least, the Baron had bought PNG another chance at life.
At 23 minutes, PNG began pushing forward with the Baron buff.
Unfortunately, UG handled the minion waves perfectly. PNG failed to gain much from the push, only managing to take the outer towers on both side lanes.
At 25:37, UG’s top laner Park Se-woo succeeded in split-pushing and destroyed PNG’s tier-two top tower.
Wei Ye’s Verdant Treant was completely unsuitable for split-pushing. Its waveclear was too slow, and PNG lacked a frontline in straight-up teamfights, meaning he was required to participate with the team—
As a result, PNG’s composition weakness became exposed: nobody could properly deal with Park Se-woo’s split push.
Da Ju analyzed: “In the past, Wind could split-push because PNG drafted champions like Starry Sky Spirit or Phantom Trickster for him! Soulreaper King excels in front-to-back teamfights. If Wind isn’t present in a direct fight, PNG instantly explodes the moment they get engaged on! And compared to assassin mages, Soulreaper King still lacks enough mobility. Letting him split-push alone is far too dangerous!”
But at the same time, the previous Baron fight had also exposed UG’s own problem: They had no frontline.
Their only frontline was support Radiant Goddess—but how many tank items could a poor support realistically afford? The rest of the team were all squishy carries. The later the game went, the worse that weakness would become!
Kim Seok-chan understood this as well, so he directed his teammates to focus on farming and prepare for one decisive battle around the next Baron spawn.
At 29 minutes, UG once again set up around the Baron pit.
But by now, the fully scaled Shadowmoon Gun was still applying pressure in side lanes. PNG had no choice but to send someone to handle the waves, preventing them from reaching the Baron area immediately.
“Leave’s split-pushing is way too annoying, and PNG has no choice but to answer it!” Qing Ci sighed bitterly. “If they ignore the side lane, then once they lose the Baron fight, UG can instantly end the game in one push! PNG absolutely cannot gamble on that. But if they deal with the waves first, Baron becomes extremely difficult to contest! Leave still has TP, and once he teleports to Baron pit, Shadowmoon Gun kills Baron incredibly fast—”
After all, Park Se-woo had once been the king of marksmen. The moment he arrived, it was essentially like UG had a fully built three-item marksman helping them take Baron. The objective melted at terrifying speed!
Baron HP: 4500… 3000… 1000…
Chao Mi inhaled sharply. “——UG successfully slays Baron! This next push is going to be unbelievably hard to defend!”
UG set up a textbook 1-4 siege formation, simultaneously pressuring both mid and top lanes.
Park Se-woo and Lee Dong-il instantly became PNG’s greatest nightmares— One continuously shoved waves forward and rotated endlessly between top and mid; the other carried the Baron buff and casually tossed bombs everywhere, caring about nobody. Whoever got hit instantly lost over half their HP bar!
“Reeco’s damage is honestly getting ridiculous too. His positioning is so cowardly. He’s just standing at maximum range throwing QQQQ…”
Lee Dong-il himself was having the time of his life. What orb-walking scripts? What wrist injuries from perfect kiting? Never heard of them, alright? Right now, all he knew was QQQQ, throw bombs, and enjoy life!
At 31 minutes, both inhibitor lanes were broken. After desperately resisting, PNG barely managed to defend their Nexus turrets and core crystal.
“Mmm…” Da Ju pondered for a long while before slowly speaking. “This game… honestly feels over. The early deficit was just too massive. The fact that PNG managed to drag it out this long is already impressive. Several fights were won purely through the players forcing miracle plays with individual skill, including the Baron fight…”
At 35 minutes, UG returned for one final push with every cooldown available.
PNG’s double carries produced incredible outplays, surviving by the skin of their teeth and trading two for three, taking down UG’s mid, marksman, and jungle!
But one terrifying carry still remained on the Rift—Park Se-woo! Wei Ye and Ji Yunyu could stop him from chasing kills, but nobody could stop him from hitting the towers!
Tap tap, tap tap— Park Se-woo’s Shadowmoon Gun looked like the ultimate LP addict winning his very first ranked game. He completely ignored PNG’s top laner and jungler closing in around him. Flash used, E dash used—he cared about nobody, only auto-attacking the Nexus—
Final 10 HP!
Before Shadowmoon Gun could be killed, Park Se-woo successfully destroyed the last sliver of health on PNG’s Nexus!
At 36 minutes and 48 seconds, the match ended!
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